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Wear OS is showing signs of life again in 2020 with the Qualcomm Snapdragon Wear 4100 platform possibly delivering the performance and efficiency that has been missing, but for many of us, a fitness tracker is still the better wearable option to pair with our Android phones. Fitness trackers can deliver the features most people are looking for from their wearable like basic notifications and of course fitness tracking at a more affordable price and with considerably better battery life.
Let’s take a look at some of the top options in the market today, regardless of your goals with a wearable there is likely one on this list that will get the job done.
While I normally associate Garmin with higher-end GPS smartwatches, the company has quietly offered one of the best lines of fitness trackers with the Vivosmart for years now. The current generation is the Vivosmart 4 and it comes in just below $100.
The Vivosmart 4 is the lone option on this list that doesn’t let you swap out bands, so you are going to want to consider your color choice carefully, there are 4 options to choose from. (Midnight, Berry, Gray, and Azure Blue.) Thankfully this is again a thin and minimal design, so it won’t dominate your wrist regardless of the option you choose.
The Vivosmart 4 uses a black and white OLED display like the Inspire HR, at this size and given the information that is being displayed I don’t consider this to be a problem really, but the color screens of the Mi Band 4 or Galaxy Fit will be preferable to some. Battery life is on par with the Galaxy Fit at 7 days on a charge.
One of the big differentiators for the Vivosmart 4 is the Pulse Ox sensor in addition to the more traditional heart rate sensor. This can provide more useful data regarding how your body is handling exercise as well as provide useful data regarding the quality of your sleep. Garmin uses this data to produce a Body Battery score that is meant to give you an idea of when to exercise versus when you should be perhaps trying to recover energy.
The Vivosmart 4 supports text, call, and app notifications and like the Galaxy Fit you can customize some quick replies if you are unable to access your smartphone.
Fitness tracking is solid with a number of activities that will be automatically recognized and tracked by Move IQ, such as walking, swimming, cycling, running or elliptical training and a number of other activities that can be triggered manually. Those that are into weight training may be particularly interested in the Vivosmart 4 as it will give you estimates on exercises, reps, sets and both work and rest times while lifting.
Like Fitbit the Garmin Connect app encourages a social component to share and compete against your fellow Garmin Connect users, so if you already know some Garmin users that may be a factor for you.
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